Disturbing Behavior
by Dimitri A
Summary: Slash, VFR. Virgil left after the Big Bang, but when his father dies he comes back to a different place. Looking into his father’s death leads him to discovering about expirements on Metahumans, and that’s the simple part.
1. Sometimes it Rains Inside My Head

Disturbing Behavior

I don't own Static Shock and no…I'm not high. Or insane

Author: Dimitri Aidan

Rating: Pg-13/T, maybe R/M…I don't know yet.

Pairing: Virgil/Richie/Francis, Ebon/Talon, past V/someone else.

Warnings: Slash, Character Death, Alternate Universe, attempted non-con, slight DC X-over.

Summary: Virgil left after the Big Bang, but when his father dies he comes back to a different place. Looking into his father's death leads him to experiments on Metahumans, and that's just the start.

Notes: Dimly based on the movie of the same name. I took the basic plot, melded it with Static, and then crushed it with a hammer. The bits and pieces, along with some other concepts, have become this. It'll probably be long, winding, and go all sorts of places that have nothing to do with the movie. Just…so you know.

00000000000000000000000000000

Prelude

Sometimes it Rains Inside my Head

00000000000000000000000000000

Robert Hawkins was a pretty average man, who'd lost his wife far to early and had done his best to raise his son and daughter to be good people. But…maybe he hadn't done a good enough job. Yes, his daughter was a wonderful, smart, beautiful young woman who'd graduated top of her class. Sharon was…everything he could have hoped for and so much more.

Her mother would have been so proud to see their little girl so grown up.

His son however, he didn't want to imagine what his wife would think if she were still alive. Then again if she were alive maybe this wouldn't have happened. Virgil had always been restless, wanting something that Robert couldn't seem to give him and maybe, maybe, it was his mother. The trouble had started years ago but up until now Robert had ignored it, hoped it was a phase, prayed for guidance of some kind.

He'd turned a blind eye. After all the parents he'd told to get involved, all the teens he'd talked to and helped at the Community Center he'd willingly turned a blind eye to his own child. Because Virgil was a good kid and if he just waited he'd grow out of the phase, go back to being wide-eyed boy who read comics and watched horror movies with the skinny blond kid down the block.

"Pops." Virgil's voice, soft but cold stirred him from his thoughts. Virgil was wearing an orange jumpsuit and his hands were cuffed to the iron bar under the defendant's table. Something in Robert twisted, flared up and then died at the sight of his son in such a sight. "Hey, don't look so worried. It's fine."

"Of course Virgil." He forced a smile and got one in return.

A door opened and everyone went quiet, Virgil turning back to face the judge as she strode back into the courtroom, face a stony mask. She reclaimed her seat then folded her hands over her desk, staring down at them with dark hazel eyes. Melissa Stricklin, a stickler for rules and order as well as an old friend. Robert had been before her many times at the side of a child from the Center, willing to lend support and put in a good word.

He'd never thought he'd be here for his own son.

"Virgil Hawkins, please rise."

Virgil blinked mildly, looking down at his bonds before looking back at the judge. His lips twitched as if he was going to say something but, right before the moment Robert knew would land his son in jail, he stood chains clinking as he did.

"You've been pled guilty to the crimes of Breaking and Entering and Destruction of Public Property. Do you have anything you'd like to say before sentencing?"

Virgil shook his head, though he did give his lawyer a slightly dirty look. "I'm good."

"Well, these are not your first crimes and your actions have been overlooked many times by the police because of your family's standing in the community. I knew your mother very well Mr. Hawkins and she would be heartbroken to see what you have become and I know your father must be as well." Her eyes flickered up for a moment and the sympathy was palpable. "You could have been hurt because of your foolishness and are very lucky that the chemicals from that accident didn't do any damage to you young man.

"Since no one was hurt and your father is such a moral citizen and you have admitted to your crimes I have decided to be lenient with you. You will, until you are 18 and not a day before then, be put into the custody of Gotham's Home for Boys. Hopefully they will be able to work through whatever issues it is that you have."

Virgil's mouth dropped open in disbelief and a strangled noise escaped. Sharon, who'd been stoic and silent thus far, bowed her head and began to cry. Robert could understand the sentiment, Gotham's Home was jokingly called 'Kiddie Arkam' and more often than not those who went in bad came out much worse.

Calling it lenient was almost laughable.

"Fuck." Virgil muttered, turning to look back at his father who simply sagged under the weight of his son's gaze. "Pops…I'll write."

This was said with an almost quirky grin. The next few moments were a blur; Virgil was led off somewhere for transport and people talked to him, offering sympathy. Sharon was led away by Adam, her boyfriend, and Robert just sat and let it all sink in.

He had failed his son completely.

00000000

Just setting the mood folks. Continue on to chapter one. Assuming it's up. It's my intent to put them up together but I'm still working out bugs here and there… eh.

I still maintain that I'm not on drugs. Feel free to ask any questions you want, should you be confused, and I'll answer them the best that I can.


	2. I Remind Myself of Somebody Else

Disturbing Behavior

I don't own Static Shock and no…I'm not high. Or insane

Author: Dimitri Aidan

Rating: Pg-13/T, maybe R/M…I don't know yet.

Pairing: Virgil/Richie/Francis, Ebon/Talon, past V/someone else.

Warnings: Slash, Character Death, Alternate Universe, attempted non-con, slight DC X-over.

Summary: Virgil left after the Big Bang, but after his father's death he comes back and everything is different. Looking into his father's death leads him to experiments on Metahumans, and that's just the start.

Notes: V's old 'flame' isn't an OC, but a DC character. We'll get into it later, I promise. Right now it's a secret…an obvious secret really. You get three guesses…

0000000000000000000000000000

Chapter One

I remind myself of somebody else

0000000000000000000000000000

The 'Welcome to Dakota City' sign was green, with the outline of the downtown skyline painted above the white block letters and the suspected population under the name. The number had dropped dramatically since the Big Bang, the event that had quickly become synonymous with the name of the city. People, the ones not affected beyond being terrorized, had fled in fear of the 'Mutants' that roamed about unchecked.

Virgil Hawkins was, at eighteen, a fairly normal teenager. If normal teenagers lost their mothers very young and went onto to get caught in genetically mutating chemicals blasts, get sent away to a detention center at fifteen, and lost their fathers within a three year period. Yes, if all of that was normal then he was poster child for all that was normal.

He hadn't felt truly normal, whatever the hell that meant, in a very very long time…long before the Big Bang anyway. His life had been…out of sorts since his mother had died. He wasn't ashamed to admit that something inside of him had just…never been right. Empty in a way that nothing in Dakota City had been able to help, even though his father had known the best of the best.

His CD player was little more than background noise to his thoughts, some band he didn't know about and didn't care about but that he couldn't seem to stop listening to. He didn't even know the lyrics, or like this kind of music, but this CD was…part of him. A memory.

In the end he'd broken into one too many houses, gotten into one too many fights, one too many fires…just gotten into too much shit in general and not even his father's reputation could keep him out of trouble with the courts. Still, they'd been lenient, sending him to Gotham's Home for Boys, and he used the term 'home' loosely, until he was eighteen. His birthday had been a few months ago, he'd been free to come home that day, but he hadn't.

He was loathe to admit it but he had liked Gotham once he managed to avoid getting killed by the crazies, liked the people he'd met and though that place sure as hell hadn't fixed him he'd had a good thing going on out there for a while. But he couldn't stay away anymore. What had been holding him to Gotham was gone now, had been gone for some time and he'd just been lingering like a ghost, and his sister had asked for him. He hadn't seen her but a handful of times while he'd been gone and she wanted him home. For the first time in years she'd spoken to him and wanted him to come back.

He couldn't refuse; not now.

Their father had been murdered almost…a week ago now. The funeral was tomorrow and Virgil would be back in Dakota High School, a place he'd barely spent a semester in because of how rarely he'd actually felt the urge to go, on Monday. This was the last place he wanted to be under the worst possible circumstances but there was nowhere else he could be.

Sharon was all he had now since the _incident, _as people at the Home were so fond of calling it. Virgil called it the day his heart had been ripped out and crushed.

_Blue eyes, glittering as darkly as the smirk he was wearing, lips pale red and forming his name. His voice was raspy and panting, but painfully sweet against his ear, drawing him in. He was black hair and pale skin for miles, wound around him like liquid warmth, red rivers of sticky coolness staining his hands, his clothes, his mind and-_

It was the skipping of his CD player and the sudden ringing of a half-dozen phones that made him snap back into reality. Another attack. They were far and few between now, fading like everything else did eventually, but they were still as powerful as in the beginning.

He'd slumped down in his seat, cool sweat running down his skin. It was a small matter of reigning in the energy he was putting out, feeling the rush of electricity as it wormed back under his skin and into his body, blanketing him with a strange comforting tingle. It took a considerable amount longer for his shivers to subside and much longer for the people on the bus to stop making a fuss over the fact that phones were so much useless plastic now.

They didn't suspect him of course, but they were furious none the less. He pulled out the ruined batteries in his player, tossing them aside and, when he was sure no one was listening, sending a charge into it. It jumped back to life and he leaned back, sighing. They were winding through the town now, a part that Virgil remembered. The junkyard and the abandoned gas station, homes with the windows broken and boarded over, cars abandoned and stripped.

Close to the bus stop. He pulled his bag from the overhead and held it in his lap, closing his eyes for a moment. The music thrummed softly, sad and full of longing, but it still didn't register for him. He doubted it would ever be more than fuzziness in the back of his mind.

The bus rolled to a stop and he could see his sister standing there, waiting, with her boyfriend at her side. She looked much the same, though she'd traded the pigtails for something short, sleek, and professional, which seemed to go along with the pressed pants suit and briefcase perfectly. A social worker, or at least in training to be, and unofficial counselor at their father's youth center, she'd followed in their father's footsteps like she'd always wanted to.

The perfect child and the juvenile delinquent. Lovely.

"Oh my god, Virgil." She was on him before he was even all the way off the bus. "Look at you! You look so…tall. Jesus."

He couldn't help the quiet laugh, unexpected as it was, as he pulled her into a hug. She did have a point though, he'd been shorter than her when he left and was now nearly two heads taller, and the gangly awkward teen was…not gone exactly, but filled out at least.

He was still known to trip over his own feet from time to time.

"You look good V." He looked over Sharon's head at Adam, who offered a small lopsided smile. "Better than…before."

"Ah." Before. Three months, three very long months ago. His eighteenth birthday had been quite the affair, in a sick and twisted sort of way. "Thanks man. You been taking care of my sister?"

"Oh please." Sharon jabbed him hard between the ribs but didn't try to end the hug. "Like I have ever needed anyone to look after me."

"Of course baby." Adam said agreeably. He flashed Virgil another, smaller, smile that was all the answer he needed. He hadn't been worried; Adam was a great guy even if he'd run into a little trouble at first. He'd come to the center, met Sharon, and the rest had just…fallen into place.

"Don't make me hurt you." Sharon said, finally pulling away enough to look up at Virgil, dark brown eyes serious. "I've missed you little brother. It's good to have you home."

He nodded. "I'm glad to be back."

00000000

The funeral went off without a hitch, of course. It was a nice day, bright yellow sun, trees golden and red as far as the eye could see, and chirping birds and all of that good stuff all around them. Probably one of the last nice days as October began to fade into November. More people than Virgil could count came out to pay their respects, some quiet, some crying, and some laughing quietly as they swapped stories about his father. Virgil had known that he'd helped a lot of people but he hadn't pictured quite so many.

His dad would have been really…pleased.

He'd spent the night before at the apartment, staying in Ivan's room since the other teen was suspiciously absent. He'd glanced him at the funeral, far in the background with two others, a redhead and a brunette, but they'd been gone before Virgil had a chance to see them again. He spent the night after the funeral at the apartment again, keeping Sharon company as she wrote out the letters of thanks to everyone who'd come to say a kind word or drop off a casserole, pie, or cake.

Virgil doubted he'd ever understand the whole giving food after someone dies thing, as if that would somehow make things better, but he found he couldn't argue with Mrs. Thompson's tune casserole and had eaten it without so much as a sarcastic remark or eye roll. She was getting on in years but the silver haired woman who'd lived next to them their whole lives certainly hadn't lost any of her skill.

It was too bad Sharon had never taken her up on her offers to teach her how to cook.

Tonight…tonight he was back home. Alone.

The house was quiet, painfully so, except for the sound of his own breathing. While the house he'd grown up in had never been crowded, even when his mother had been alive, now it was almost scary. Sharon had moved out over the summer, she'd explained as they'd walked down the eerily quiet hall towards the kitchen. The apartment was closer to school and the center, but she'd seen their father everyday at the center and had been around as much as she could.

She'd said it all with wide eyes as if trying to make him understand that she hadn't abandoned their father. Virgil had never even thought it, but he could see the guilt written all over her face. When their father had been mugged and killed she'd been at school, delayed by a cop who seemed to think she had outstanding tickets only to have it turn out she didn't have even one to her name. Her voice had been soft and husky and Adam had reached over to hold her hand, squeezing gently.

Virgil didn't think she had anything to be sorry for, things…happened. At least she hadn't been in another state, wallowing in near constant self-pity. Maybe he should have come home when he was supposed to, maybe he would have been there and been able to stop what happened…maybe things could have been different.

They'd spent the afternoon sorting through their father's things and trying to get everything in order with the center and the house and car and bills. Chinese food had been ordered, paid for and picked at by all of them, no one really able to eat in light of what they were doing. Going though their father's things, keeping what was important and disposing of what wasn't. Throwing away parts of the man who'd raised them.

Sharon wasn't sure what to do at the moment, if the house should be sold and then a bigger apartment found or the apartment left and the house moved back into. It hadn't been solved yet, as Virgil hadn't had much of an opinion, though the thought of selling the place he'd grown up had, for a moment, made his throat too tight to breathe.

She'd left, gone home, and here he was in his old bedroom, staring at the ceiling with that CD playing again. Over and over without stopping, he'd scratch the thing into oblivion at this rate. He rolled over, onto his side, and shut his eyes. He needed to sleep, he'd promised Sharon he'd go to school and put forth an effort at doing good and that wouldn't happen if he passed out his first day back. He had to make this work for Sharon and for his father.

He had a chance so he might as well take it.

Sleep wasn't easy in coming. He wasn't used to the quiet; Gotham was never quiet. A major city, on of the nation's biggest and it never stopped. Not even it's wide array of painted, freakish villains could do more than make Gotham pause for a second.

Even before he'd left it hadn't been this quiet. His dad slept with the TV on and Sharon had listened to music until the wee hours of the morning when she'd wake just long enough to turn her stereo off. Somehow Virgil's player couldn't compete.

He jerked, eyes opening, when the chime of the doorbell echoed almost mournfully through the darkness. He sat up, slipping the headphones off and getting out of bed. Heedless of the fact he was only wearing pajama pants he headed down the steps and to the door, where he could make out a shadowed figure. He put his hands on the door, readying himself in case of something dangerous, and opened it.

His hand, which had just been starting to spark, dropped to his side in confusion. "…Eh. Ivan?"

"Hey Hawkins." Ivan was tall, taller than him, thin, and dark. Everything about him was…dark. Skin, eyes, hair, and clothes…it all just oozed shadow and attitude. It was different, except for the attitude part. Much of Virgil's childhood had been spent avoiding Ivan or getting wailed on by Ivan. When Sharon and Adam had started dating he'd been convinced he'd somehow fallen into hell.

Virgil swallowed, swaying back some. "You aren't here to hit me are you?"

Ivan stared at him for a long moment then snorted, lips twitching. "Not hardly Hawkins, we're practically family…and your sister is scary. I need a place to crash and your dad was always good for a couch. I was hoping, if it's not too much trouble-"

"No! I mean, yeah…but no. …Come in."

"My hero." Ivan's sarcasm was thick and teasing, but not harsh. He walked past Virgil and in the direction of the living room, leaving the younger man to stare after him. He shut the door, locking it before following the other.

"So…you crash here a lot?"

"Enough. Adam has this weird idea in his head that I need looking after and imposed a curfew. Midnight my ass… I don't always want to hear his mouth." Ivan seemed to know exactly what he was doing, grabbing a bunch of covers from the closet and dropping them onto the couch.

"Oh."

"Look Hawkins…your dad was a good guy. Whoever it was that did this…well, they have a lot of people after their ass." Ivan paused for a moment to pull his shirt over his head and drop it on the floor carelessly. "I figure I owe him for everything he did. I…shit would be different if he hadn't been around and I hadn't been so desperate to not fuck up as bad as you did."

"I didn't…um."

Virgil was…not looking. No. Not at all. He certainly wasn't admiring Ivan or how good he looked, the way the muscles flexed under dark brown skin or…no. Really he wasn't and god why couldn't he look at something else? Ivan had beat him bloody on more than one occasion, it didn't matter how good he may look now…that body was built on the pain of skinny geeks and that was wrong.

More or less.

"See something you like Hero?" Virgil looked up and found Ivan smirking at him darkly. He tried to glare but ended up looking down at his bare feet instead. That was embarrassing. He hadn't even known he could get embarrassed anymore. "Sorry kid, I'm taken. I'll introduce you to her tomorrow, if you think you'll be up to school."

Oh yeah. School. "Didn't you-"

"Fail my senior year?" Ivan shrugged and fell back on the couch. "Like I said, if you're up to it I'll show you around."

"Um. Yeah, sure."

"Cool." Ivan yawned then stretched some. Virgil was not watching again. "So. It's what, three-ish? School's at seven."

Virgil blinked, taking a moment to let the fact that Ivan was more or less telling him to go to bed so he'd be ready for class sink in, before nodding and heading back to the stairs. He wasn't tired but he really needed to get some sleep before his brain exploded. This…

No. Just no.

000000000000

So…yeah. Ebon's not a prick. Cower in fear! …meh. It's four AM, leave me be.

Feel free to ask any questions you want, should you be confused, and I'll answer them the best that I can. (Which doesn't mean a whole lot…) Oh, and review. I like those. You know, world go 'round and all that.


End file.
